


Favoritism

by curlydots



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: F/F, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Unhealthy Relationships, Xenophobia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-19
Updated: 2020-06-19
Packaged: 2021-03-03 19:41:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24810994
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/curlydots/pseuds/curlydots
Summary: "Did you covet your captain, Michael Burnham?"
Relationships: Michael Burnham/Mirror Philippa Georgiou, Michael Burnham/Philippa Georgiou
Comments: 7
Kudos: 72





	Favoritism

**Author's Note:**

> this takes place during season 1, when Mirror!Philippa was in charge of discovery. there's references to a sexual relationship between Mirror!Michael and Mirror!Philippa but nothing graphic

She warns Michael after her first outburst not to question her on the bridge or try to expose her in front of the crew. Despite the warning, she isn't surprised that Michael is unable to stop herself from speaking out of line. Philippa has read enough about the Federation to understand how her presence grates on Michael's values but just because she understands, doesn't mean she will tolerate Michael's behavior: her clipped tone when she speak to Philippa, her constant bitter questions, they are unacceptable.

If one of her subjects in the Empire had behaved in such a way, Philippa would've thrown them in an Agonizer for several hours to straighten them out, assuming she was feeling generous. More likely she would've had them beamed into space and forgotten their transgression before long. But she is aware that this is not how things are done in the Federation and never had the heart to hurt Michael in any real way.

Philippa remains ‘Captain Georgiou’ until the very end of Beta shift, the anger and indignation burning at a slow simmer within her. She leaves the captain's chair calmly, with no apparent hurry.

"Mr. Saru," Philippa says to the alien at her right. "You have the bridge. Specialist Burnham, with me."

She sees Michael and the alien exchange a look but Philippa doesn't bother waiting. She heads straight to the turbolift, forcing Michael to jog to catch up with her.

In the turbolift, Michael stands at parade rest like she can erect a wall between them with her stiff military posture. Philippa doesn't bother trying to speak, not where they can be interrupted.

Michael follows obediently behind her as she goes to her quarters, though she hesitates slightly at the door.

Once inside, Philippa unzips her jacket and shrugs it off her shoulders. She tosses it to Michael, as she's done a thousand times, and the woman catches it with obvious surprise.

"The way you spoke to me on the bridge," Philippa says, sitting down to remove her boots, "is that how you speak to your captain?"

Michael looks at her flatly, ugly defiance in her eyes. It angers her greatly but at the same time it fascinates her to see such an unfamiliar emotion on such a familiar face. It doesn't hurt that Michael isn't capable of being truly unattractive to her.

After a long moment, Michael folds the jacket for her. She gets the feeling that it's done more out of her fastidious nature, rather than in deference to Philippa. When she's done she places the jacket on top of Philippa's dresser.

"My captain," Michael says slowly, "is not a xenophobic, genocidal dictator."

 _"I_ am your captain," Philippa says firmly. She tugs her pants down, still watching her face, and Michael turns away. "For now Discovery is mine. Do you deny this?"

"I don't agree with the decision," Michael says to the door. Her hands are folded tightly behind her back. "But I accept that—"

"Look at me when you're speaking to me, Michael," Philippa snaps. She's watched lesser people flinch at her tone but Michael simply squeezes her hands tighter and then turns back around with a sharp, neat turn. There's a blankness to her expression that she's never seen in her Michael, and she remembers again that this woman was raised among aliens who value apathy over emotion.

Michael continues carefully. "I accept that for now you have been made captain of Discovery. I don't think it was a wise decision on the part of Starfleet but I won't fight it."

"I wonder about that." Philippa grasps the bottom of her shirt and pulls it over her head. "Michael the mutineer. You've already betrayed one Philippa Georgiou, and now you undermine me every second you stand on my bridge."

A flash of guilt crosses her face. Philippa passes Michael her shirt and pants, and the woman takes them without looking away from her face. It's clearly a concerted effort on her part. "I won't do anything to jeopardize our mission,” she says softly.

"You set a precedent among the crew. An unacceptable one. I cannot have others doubting me."

Michael looks down at the shirt in her hands and begins folding it. "You're right," she says. "The way I've behaved has been unprofessional. It won't continue."

She turns to put Philippa's clothing down and has it in her to look vaguely contrite.

"Is that all?" Philippa asks.

"What else do you need?"

"Do Federation Starfleet officers not know how to apologize? You should be on your knees, begging for my forgiveness."

"That's not how things are done here. I've acknowledged my mistake. I don't feel the need to apologize."

Philippa unties her ponytail and shakes her head, letting her hair fall over her shoulders. The movement catches Michael's eyes and she seems to freeze for a moment as she watches. It lasts only for a moment and then that Vulcan wall of apathy slams down over her again and she goes cold.

"Arrogant child," Philippa mutters. She crosses over to her dresser and picks up her comb. She sits down on her bed, wearing nothing but her underwear, and holds the comb over her shoulder. "Here."

She isn't looking at Michael so she can't see whatever indignant expression she's wearing but she can hear it in her voice. "I recognize that you're new to not being waited on hand and foot but you don't have a slave here."

"I'm aware." She continues to hold out the comb.

After a moment Michael snatches the comb from her hand and stands behind her so she can comb her hair. Despite her obvious annoyance Michael is gentle with her, moving her hair onto her back with careful fingers before she begins combing it. Still, she can feel a tension in Michael that refuses to dissipate as she works.

"Is this how I'm making it up to you?" Michael asks, quietly sarcastic.

Philippa huffs. "Hardly. You can't earn an emperor's favor so easily."

Michael steps forward to her left side, moving the longer parts of her hair forward the way Philipa typically wears it. "I'm afraid you'll have to bathe yourself, your majesty."

"Your imperial majesty," Philippa corrects. "And this star ship doesn't have baths. That's the only reason you're being let off the hook."

There is a small pause, uncomfortable only on Michael's end. "Noted."

The silence stretches on with Michael carefully fixing her hair for her as though she hasn't spent the entire day being a thorn in her side. She wonders if this new Michael is imagining what she suggested. If she can intuit that Philipa has made her Michael bathe her in the past. She wonders if this Michael is jealous.

Philippa turns to her, watching her profile for a moment: the familiar strength and beauty of it. The Federation's uniform didn't suit her the way the black and gold of the Terran Empire did but it was at least form fitting.

Noticing that she's being watched, Michael stops her ministrations, comb pausing in her hair. There is a question in her eyes and her gently parted lips but she doesn't voice it. It's an expression she's seen many times in her own universe and it's a welcome one.

"Did you covet your captain, Michael Burnham?" Philippa asks.

Michael's mouth slams shut, falling into a thin line. The panic in her eyes is almost charming. "Excuse me?"

"It's a simple enough question." Philippa asks, holding Michael's hand as she clutches the comb. She rubs the back of her knuckles soothingly. "Did you hunger for her? Did the thought of your Captain Georgiou leave you aching and wanting because, while you looked at her with lust, she saw only a daughter?"

A faint trembling goes through her hand and Michael tries to pull away. Philippa tightens her grip. "You don't know what you're talking about."

"Don't I?" She moves her hand down to Michael's wrist, squeezing down on it. She can feel the rapid fire beating of her pulse beneath her fingers and warm satisfaction pools in her gut. "I know you, Michael, don't think you can hide from me."

Michael has gotten her face under control again but she hasn't freed her wrist, and the beating of her heart is very honest. "You know a version of me. _We_ only just met."

"Were you attracted to Captain Georgiou?" Philippa presses.

Instead of answering Michael asks, with all the weight of an accusation, "what was your relationship with my counterpart?"

Philippa smiles faintly. "Mother and child," she says, a sardonic lit to her voice.

"I find that unlikely."

"It's the truth. I raised her and she was mine."

"And what does that mean?"

Without warning she swings Michael around, pulling her down so she falls into her lap. Michael flails uncomfortably, trying to push herself out of Philippa's lap with none of her usual grace. Her free hand makes contact with Philippa's bare shoulder but she pulls it back like she's been scalded, nearly upending herself in the process.

"I don’t like the tone you use with me," Philippa says, catching Michael around the waist. "That is not how you earn my favor."

Michael wrestles herself forcefully out of her lap and lands beside her on the bed, her wrist remains in Philippa's grasp.

"Let go or I'll break your hand," she says firmly.

"I doubt that very much, Michael."

"Just because you look like her—"

Philipa cuts her denials short by slapping her across the face, softer than she's struck others for lesser crimes, but by no means gently. Michael turns back to her with a very appealing fire in her eyes, a hundred instincts and calculations at war with each other over the face Philippa happens to wear.

"I told you to watch your tone with me." She places a hand to Michael's cheek and the woman grits her teeth, beautiful rage building there. "Vulcans clearly don't believe in disciplining their children. Force is the only thing a self-respecting Terran responds to. It always worked with my daughter."

"If your only goal is to breed resentment and fear." She shoves Philippa's hand off her face. "I can see how force became your ideal."

Philipa sits up on her knees and crawls forward. She watches with some amusement as Michael jolts and starts backing herself further onto the bed in her attempt to get away. She's still maintaining perfect eye contact with her, refusing to look at any other part of her body, even though it's right in front of her.

"What are you so afraid of, Michael?" Philippa asks, a hand on her knee. She can feel Michael trembling beneath the simple contact.

"What was the nature of your relationship with my counterpart?" Michael asks again, voice as steady as her Vulcan father's, even as her back hits the headboard.

Philippa crawls over her body, positioning herself so she's nearly straddling the other woman. There's tension running through Michael and she's breathing much faster. "I've already told you."

"Unless this is how Terran mothers act around their daughters, you're lying to me."

Philippa places a hand on her shoulder, simply feeling her through her uniform. But then she slides it to Michael's throat, tantalizingly slow, and brings her thumb gently around her windpipe, the threat present, but not immediate.

"You were sleeping with her weren't you?" Michael asks. "You raised her, called her your daughter, mourned her death, and yet—"

Philipa squeezes down on her throat with a sudden force that silences her next words. Just as quickly as she presses down however she let's go. She expects Michael to finally try to fight her after that and is pleasantly surprised when she doesn't.

"Sleeping with her," Philippa mocks, lowering her weight onto Michael's thighs. She has all of her counterpart's lean muscle but her uniform is comfortable against Philippa's skin despite its aesthetic failings. "What a way to trivialize the most important relationship in both of our lives."

"You accused Lorca of grooming me," Michael says, voice breathy, "as though you hadn't raised your Burnham as a pet."

"Why would I approve of him trespassing like that?" Her hand leaves Michael's throat and slides with measured slowness away from her neck, down past the top of her uniform, her collarbone, and then comes to a stop near her sternum between the swell of her breasts. "I have been very accommodating with you, answered your questions. Now answer mine, Michael."

Michael's gaze flickers down to Philippa's body extremely quickly, going back to eye contact before she can linger on the failure. "It's none of your—"

Philippa shoves a hand down between them, slipping it into the part of Michael's thighs and grabbing at her crotch through her clothing. Michael makes a choking noise and her hands come up to grip Philippa's biceps. She doesn't try to push Philippa away and her legs clamp down around the hand between them.

"Tell me," Philippa says. "I want to hear how, even in an entirely different universe, you couldn't help wanting me."

"You—you aren't the same person," Michael says, voice tight. “You aren't her."

"No, I'm not." She rubs at Michael through her uniform, watching her squirm, attempts at Vulcan calm gone. "But that doesn't matter. You want your captain enough to ignore how much you hate my values."

She knows she's right, the guilt in Michael's eyes is admission enough that her high minded Federation ideals aren't at war with her desires so much as they've been trampled by them.

"You called me 'daughter' earlier."

"Do you want me to apologize for not living up to your values?" She tilts Michael's face upwards, inching closer so their lips are nearly touching. "Emperors doesn’t apologize."

With that she kisses Michael, still holding her by the chin to keep her in place. She's expecting more resistance, more obvious denial of her feelings, but Michael returns the fairly gentle kiss with heat and aggression, shutting her eyes and moaning against Philippa's mouth.

"There's my girl," she mutters against Michael's lips. Perhaps Michael isn't in the mood to hear her speak because she dives straight into the kiss again, hands hungrily roaming Philippa's back. Philippa allows this for a time; after all just admitting her attraction to someone she finds repugnant must be difficult for her.

Michael lifts her hips, grinding herself into Philippa's hand like she can't help it. The sight is familiar to her, her Michael was always so selfish in bed when left to her own devices, and she almost says as much. Almost whispers that it feels like it’s been decades since she last had Michael. But ultimately she keeps the thought to herself.

This woman, beautiful and familiar as she was, wasn't her Michael, and would likely never understand the depth of their bond. But that didn't mean that the two of them weren't still connected. After all, what were the odds of them finding each other across universes and still wanting each other?

"Get up," Philippa says, once she's grown tired of indulging Michael. She pulls her hand away from Michael's body.

Michael blinks at her, looking vaguely disoriented. "What?"

"Get up. I want to watch you cast off that uniform you're so proud of."

For a while Michael just looks at her, like she thinks Philippa might change her mind, but Philippa does nothing but wait, the last of her patience wearing thin. Eventually Michael slips out from under her. Philippa sits back on her knees to watch as she finally starts to undress, every inch of unfamiliar fabric revealing skin she knows and that she's dreamed of for months.

She expects Michael to hesitate in her undressing but once she's started she doesn't allow herself time for second guessing. She places her clothing aside, then her underwear with it, before her eyes meet Philippa's and it becomes clear from the heat in them that she's not thinking with her calculated Vulcan mind anymore. Michael is missing a line of scars that Philippa gave her across her chest and refused to allow her to have healed. She's still beautiful without them, but the mark of Philippa's ownership is sorely missed.

Michael folds her hands behind her back, as though she hasn't noticed at all that she's naked. The posture straightens out her spine and pushes out her chest. "Is something the matter?" she asks. Her voice is too heavy to pass for nonchalant.

"Not at all. If I want to look at you, then I'll look at you. I'll look at you for as long as I want." Michael fidgets a little under her gaze and Philippa lets herself enjoy it briefly. She smiles at Michael. "You're lucky I'm feeling impatient. Come here. I want you in your place."

Confusion crosses Michael's face, followed by what she's sure is a denial when Philippa gestures for her to lay down beneath her. However the refusal goes unvoiced and Michael comes forward, lying down under her parted thighs. She's nearly vibrating.

"How long have you craved this?" Philippa asks, almost kindly. Michael refuses to say anything but from the near suffocating hunger radiating from her it's been a long time. She's finally allowing herself to look at Philippa's body and the raw emotion in her, is arresting in its humanity. She wishes she'd killed Sarek for grafting his inferior culture onto a being so vibrant and beautiful.

"Tell me how much you wanted her," Philippa demands. Her thumb is pressed to the soft part of Michael's lips. "Tell me how much you want _me_."

Michael doesn't say anything, perhaps she can't voice the truth aloud, but she opens her mouth easily and lets Philippa's thumb slide inside. Her lips close around it and she laps at it with her tongue.

Philippa decides she can be merciful.

She kicks off her panties, not bothering to climb off Michael to do so, and then takes her place by her shoulders, hovering above her. She's been vaguely aroused since Michael started questioning her on the bridge but seeing Michael underneath her like this has made her arousal much less vague.

"You'll make it good for me, won't you, Michael?" she asks, stroking Michael's cheek.

In answer Michael surges forward, grabbing Philippa's thighs and pulling her down against her mouth. Philippa laughs aloud and allows herself to sink into the insistent press of a tongue at her folds.

" _Yes_ ," Philippa groans. She grabs at Michael's hair, tightening a hand in the short curls as she guides Michael's mouth. Michael moans under her as though she's never tasted anything better than Philippa and shudders.

"How does your emperor taste?" Philippa asks, grinding down against Michael's tongue. She rather likes that Michael can't answer like this and doesn't even try to. She's too focused on wrapping her lips around Philippa's clit and sucking at her. "That's my good girl."

She tugs roughly at Michael's hair and feels the pins keeping it in place pop free and bounce across her bed. Michael shuts her eyes and moans into the wet folds of Philippa's cunt. She can feel Michael shifting under her, thighs clenching around nothing as she seeks some friction of her own, but she doesn't stop pleasing Philippa.

"Michael," she sighs. She presses down on Michael's head, keeping her still while she rides her face. Her thighs shake in Michael's hands but she's never felt ashamed of reveling in her own pleasure. Michael is clearly doing the same if the shameless noise she makes around Philippa is any indication.

Perhaps she's the one who's craved this for too long, orperhaps Michael is just much better at this than she has any right to be, but she doesn't last long. Michael presses down hard on her clit with her tongue and Philippa it's thrown trembling into orgasm, as though she didn't frequently let her subjects try their best to please her. She's almost disappointed in herself.

It takes a minute of Michael tapping her repeatedly on the thigh before she considers the fact that having her weight on her face might be suffocating her and moves lower, sitting on Michael's stomach.

Michael is breathing hard, breasts heaving and face wet with her own saliva and Philippa's fluids. She does nothing as Philippa wipes her mouth and chin for her.

"I suppose this means I'm forgiven?" Michael asks, eyebrow raised with quiet humor. Her eyes are still darkened by lust and she licks her lips: all the more appealing for how she doesn't so with no obvious erotic intent.

"No," Philippa says bluntly, refusing to move from her perch. She takes Michael's hand in hers and guides it down between her legs. After a moment Michael takes over for her, rubbing gentle circles over her. "Perhaps by the time our shifts start again, you'll be forgiven."

Michael sighs. "I suppose I should've known the Emperor of the Terran Empire would be greedy."

"Greed is the defining trait of a good tyrant," Philippa says, leaning down to kiss Michael again. She suspects that Michael thinks she's exaggerating but in truth her indulgence is running thin, and she wants to hear Michael beg for her.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! check out my [twitter](http://twitter.com/primordialkirby) if you want 🖖


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